Do large skill gaps CREATE toxic players?
this experiment prompted me to consider the ramifications of ranked games (or normal) with a high-to-medium frequency of large skill gaps on league players.
that is kind of a mouthful, but i will elaborate...
with a hypothetical ranked game between G 1, 4, S 1, 2, & 4 and G 4, 4, 5, 5, & S 2
this is the ranked game http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/upecpYHB-platinum-promos-places-me-with-three-silvers this player had for his plat promos on the 28th of july, 2016 (aka yesterday)
with a gap in rank there comes a gap in knowledge or understanding of the game (assuming the player isn't boosted) so when a diamond ranked player makes a mistake that diamond ranked players usually make, the other diamond players will be somewhat understanding, altho they'll likely point it out, and said player will know they made a mistake and try to avoid it in the future. a silver ranked player might not even recognize that same exact mistake as such, and could make it several times during the game, and other silvers likely will not recognize the mistake as such, and would likely blame the "op champ," other players for not helping in time, simply think it was luck-related, or some other completely wrong reason... but if other silvers don't recognize the mistake, they would still remain fairly understanding.
when team 1 has one g1 player and most of the rest silver ranked players, there will be situations where mistakes will go unnoticed by half the team, and the g1 will point out the mistake, and request that it not be repeated or give advice to prevent it from happening again. even though he might not understand how someone could even make such a mistake, after all, "this is gold, not bronze". and he could get very negative responses for this friendly tip to improve their chances at winning: the other silver players defend and/or flame the g1 for pointing out the mistake, call g1 a toxic player, threaten to report him after the 1st comment g1 has made (not likely, but it has happened to me)... rinse-lather-repeat: this happens 3 times in the 53 min game (it's much more likely that many more mistakes happened in such a long game) and by the end of the game half the team is convinced the other half is trolling/toxic, and they may be right. on the other hand, if the g1 player makes a common higher rank gold mistake, the silver players wont realize why it was a mistake, and will attribute it to other things, sometimes assuming the g1 is simply feeding, and they attempt to help the g1 with friendly advice (which doesn't address the issue) and the g1 player tells them that isn't what went wrong, the real mistake was [such and such] and the silver players may see the right of it, but more likely will disagree, and both parties will assume the other doesn't know what they're talking about.
this is the average scenario. most players, with as much of a rank gap as these team mates have, will experience this same pattern regardless of the game outcome. both sides (the g1 side and the silver side) will be more toxic than they normally would be during this game. they might become more toxic in the future due to this game. there toxicity levels might increase exponentially with more games with such high skill disparity.
assume that all of the players have extremely high tolerance levels and are much much more patient than average: the outcome would be very different, but it would greatly tax each player emotionally/mentally from using so much willpower to resist calling people stupid, or bad at league, for 53 mins straight. then they may play more games, with reduced vigor/willpower, and wont be so forgiving next game. maybe it only be 1 or 2 negative comments. maybe they will just silently rage in their rooms. maybe they will post in the boards to let others see how frustrating their situation is. in either case, the games that follow the 1st extremely taxing ranked game will cause them to be more "toxic" than they were before. imagine if they played 5 more games with the same skill disparity... imagine if they played 10, 20, 30, 100 games with such a skill disparity.
they would become toxic players, constantly pointing out mistakes with a bit of venom in their tips. if you've read this far, you should understand the point i have made:
** TL;DR**: games where there is a large skill-gap between teammates CAUSE TOXIC PLAYERS because there is a gap in understanding the fundamentals of the game, which creates animosity.
if you doubt this, please say so, and i would be happy to further explain why it's true. [slayer-pantheon-thumbs]
